[ Why You Shouldn’t Be Proud of a “Compliant” Workforce ]

In my experience, most leaders want to cultivate a work environment where employees feel like valued individuals — they’re just terrified of being sued. This may explain why HR departments are often empowered to focus solely on mitigating the risk of bad apples.

And employees can tell: A survey by Globoforce found that 47% of employees don’t believe their employers care about developing a “human” workplace.

In a wonderful onboarding program I was fortunate to participate in, new hires were asked about previous negative work experiences. One woman shared that when her grandmother (who had raised her) passed away, her employer wouldn’t allow her any bereavement time off. Company policy applied to “immediately family” only, and her grandmother didn’t meet that definition.